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ChristianKl comments on Welcome to Less Wrong! (8th thread, July 2015) - Less Wrong
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Hi from San Diego, California. I'm an attorney with academic training in molecular biology (BS, MS, PhD). I have an intense interest in politics, specifically the cognitive biology/social science of politics. I'm currently reading The Rationalizing Voter by Lodge and Taber. I have read both of Tetlock's books, Haidt's Righteous Mind, Khaneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow, Thaler's Nudge, Achen and Bartels Democracy for Realists and a few others. I also took a college-level MOOC on cognitive biology and attendant analytic techniques (fMRI, etc) and one on the biology of decision making in economics.
Based on what I have taught myself over the last 6-7 years, I came up with a new "objective" political ideology or set of morals that I thought could be used to at least modestly displace or supplement standard "subjective" ideologies including liberalism, conservatism, capitalism, socialism, Christianity, anarchy, racism, nationalism and so on. The point of this was an attempt to build an intellectual framework that could help to at least partially rationalize politics, which I see as mostly incoherent/irrational from my "objective" public-interest oriented point of view.
I have tried to explain myself to both lay audiences (I'm currently a moderator at Harlen's Place, a politics site on Disqus https://disqus.com/home/channel/harlansplace/ ), but have failed. I confess that I'm becoming discouraged at the possibility of applying cognitive and social science to even slightly rationalize politics. What both Haidt and Lodge/Tabor have to say, makes me think that what I am trying is futile. I have tried contact about 50-60 academics, including Tetlock, Haidt, Bartels and Taber, but none have responded with any substance (one got very annoyed and chewed me out for wasting his time; http://www.overcomingbias.com/ ) - most don't respond at all. I get that -- everyone is busy and crackpots with new ideas are a dime a thousand.
Anyway, I stumbled across this site this morning while looking for some online content about the affect heuristic. I thought I would introduce myself and try to fit in, if I'm up to the standards here. My interest is in trying to open a dialog with one or more people who know this science better than myself so that I can get some feedback one whether what I am trying to do is a waste of time. As a novice, I suspect that I misunderstand the science and overestimate the limits of human rationality in politics in a society that lives under the US constitution (free speech).
My blog is here: http://dispol.blogspot.com/
First impressions from skim reading the blog:
That points for me into the direction of objectivism with all it's problems. There are good reasons to be quite suspicious when someone claims that they don't have an ideology and there views are simply "objective".
To me saying something like that without bringing forward a specific proposal suggests to me politcal ignorance.
The blog isn't spell-checked.
I have been arguing and debating politics online for over 7 years now and I am quite used to how people speak to each other. There is nothing at all politically ignorant in my comment. When I say something is obvious, it has to be taken in the context of the entire post. It's easy to cherry pick and criticize by the well-known and popular practice of out-of-context distortion of a snippet on content in a bigger context. I have seen that tactic dozens of times and I reject it. It's cheap shot and nothing more. You can do better. Bring it on.
My blog and all of my other online content speaks directly to the American people in their own language. I do not address academics in academic language. I have tried academic language with the general public and it doesn't work. Here's a news flash: There is an astonishing number of average adult Americans who have little or no trust in most any kind of science, social and cognitive science included. As soon as one resorts to the language of science, or even mentions something as "technical" as "cognitive science", red flags go up in many people and their minds automatically switch to conscious rationalization mode. My guess is that anti-science attitude applies to about 40-60% of adult Americans if my online experience is a reasonably accurate indicator. (my personal experience database is based on roughly 600-1,000 people -- no, I am not so stupid as to think that is definitive, it's just my personal experience)
I am trying to foster the spread of the idea that maybe, just maybe, politics might be rationalized at least enough to make some detectable difference for the better in the real world. My world is firmly based in messy, chaotic online retail politics, not any pristine, controlled laboratory or academic lecture room environment.
Political ignorance is in the eye of the beholder. You see it in me and I see it in you.
By the way, reread the blog post you criticize as making no specific proposal. There is a specific proposal there: based on the social science, remove fuel 1 from the two-fuel fire needed to spark a terrorist into being. How did you miss it? Did you read what I said, or did your eye simply float down to the offending phrase and that triggered your unconscious, irrational attack response?
I do appreciate your comment on the review of Achen and Bartel's book. If your whining about spelling errors is the best shot you have, then I am satisfied that I understand the book well enough to use to to leverage my arguments when I cross swords with non-science, real people in the real world. I have no interest in basing my politics on my misunderstanding of areas of science that are outside my formal academic training. I need to be as accurate and honest as I can so that people can't dismiss my arguments for rationality as based in ignorance, stupidity and/or mendacity. That's another cheap shot tactic I come across with some regularity. The only defense against that attack is to be correct.
Shall we continue our dance, or is this OK for you?
That's the problem. Most relevant political discussions that have real world effects don't happen online. Knowing how to debate politics online and actual knowing how politics processes work are two different things.
That's no specific proposal. The fact that you think it is suggests that you haven't talked seriously to people who make public policy but only to people on the internet who are as far removed from political processes as you are.
It's like people who are outside of mathematical academia writing proofs for important mathematical problems. They usually think that their proofs are correct because they aren't specific enough about them to see the problems that exist with them.
I read one post and gave my impression of it. The spelling errors reduce the likelihood that reading other posts would be valuable, so I stopped at that point. If you are actually interested in spreading your ideas, that's valuable information for you.